June 2005 Archives

*taken with my small, radical digital camera.

A big "thank you" to Anne & Stephen Galli!

(to be read in a somewhat exaggerated Jack Kerouac voice, preferably aloud to an audience)

So that was that. I got on my bicycle and wobbled home from the second class of my second term, bubbling over with new ideas.

In the session, we talked about rhythm, melody, grove, underpinnings... Time! We broke it all down into its parts, and, when we put those back together, there was the song again! There were the Ideas! And it was easier to see the mortar as mortar and the bricks as bricks where before there had only been a wall.

So I went home to dig Take Five with new ears. It was glorious. The way the piano puts down that pulsing road that just calls out to be travelled — it's the call of the great, dripping New York hustle, the call of Big Sur sunshine and spray and the bayou roads of back-country Louisiana. And the saxophone answers the call with its cool possibilities, like a lover that wants you to want more.

*      *      *

Whoo! That horn-playing professor is a hoot! I passed him on the stairs before class and it almost frightened me to see him, and to know that this man would be my teacher. He wore the expression that you would see if you stared into the beat face of the future of a generation and looked down through all those dues and the laughs they bought.
It's the kind of face that makes a person remember that this apple pie on your plate came out of a box, and this ice cream came out of another box, and that you live in another box still.

*      *      *

As I drove back home from walking with my sweetheart over the damp, warm, nighttime sidewalks of South East Portland, I watched the lights along Martin Luther King, Jr. Boulevard shine down the rhythm of night-driving through the beat American landscape of the Great North West, and I wondered what the faces at bus stops and in front of barbershops will know tonight that I will never know: city secrets, dream secrets; secrets behind velvet ropes and secrets under squalid back porches.

(you want a piece? go ahead.)

Pros:

Cons:

And every Wednesday, upon venturing outside, I would see that someone had pushed the barrel back up against the fence.

This wasn't so surprising. My housemates all have "regular" jobs, whereas I keep what you might call "writers' hours," and it wouldn't take them so far out of their way to take care of the can on their way to the bus stop.

"Yeah, about that."

"No, I think I need to say something to you. I have poured so many hours of my life into that fucking- your fucking project, and you don't even notice. You just expect me 'cause I'm nice."

"You totally take me for granted in every way.
"You do."

"Oh, you do notice?!"

"Oh."

"Yeah, well it doesn't come across."

"Maybe because a majority of the time I say anything it either
pisses you off or you condescend and make fun of me for it.
"Unless I'm just doing the whole 'Yes Man' schtick or something.
"It's like, you're always ranting about some bullshit you never do, or going off on this fucking INFOMERCIAL about whatever fancy thing it is you just bought or are trying to rationalize buying, and you fish and fish and basically demand enthusiasm from me, but then as soon as I come to you with something I'm excited about, whether it's a deal I got on organic strawberries or some new song I'm working on, and you find some way to piss on it."

"Yeah, well, maybe you should've thought about it. Maybe you think about someone else besides yourself sometimes, but I bet you always find some way to rationalize not doing anything about it."

"I BET YOU FUCKING DO!"

"Yeah, you're sorry?

"Yeah."

"I don't care."

"goodbye."

This is the sight that greets me every tuesday night.

Part of the "deal," or "value package," that I offer my tenants is that I take out the garbage and recycling. Sometimes I don't get around to doing this until late at night, and almost without fail the garbage can is at the curb when I go out to put it there.

For many months I thought that one of the housemates must be taking it upon him- or herself, just as a favor to me, or maybe thinking that it wouldn't get done if they didn't do it.

But, eventually, it happened when everyone else was away on holiday.

I would like to preface my last entry with a few words about Ultimate Blogger. But it's too late for a preface.

I hadn't read the entries from the Final 3, the Backstage Breakdown Challenge, and was not intentionally pastiching the Alliance business. I feel compelled to say so mostly because I was so impressed with the depth and gravity of the entries, as well as that shown by the Contestants themselves.

I flatter myself to think that I am an "A," but I must have at least a few cracks in my patina, judging by the indignant judgment I feel meet to pass on the brilliant evil strategists and their brilliant evil stratagem. I love the brilliant evil stratagem. I hate the brilliant evil stratagem. I am filled with frustration.

Now, I trust that you are well out of the mood for my short filim, here is the culmination of yesterday's entry: The Filim.

The call went out at 3:23 p.m., and I was there, ready to answer it:

Hey Dudes, We need some extras for a scene in the ... It's going to be LATE tonight. Like 11:30pm. Email us if you can make it and we'll send you more details.

HA! 11:30 p.m. is NOTHING to me. I will be there. I MUST be there.

At 3:26 p.m. I hit send, and my brief but compelling email sails swiftly towards its target:

Subject: I HAVE DREAMED OF THIS DAY!!! Date: HRH 31 May, 2005 3:26:54 PM PDT

Call me (503) 555-1212.
I have costumes and may shave my head/body if necessary.

All I can do is wait.

I wait.

DAMNIT! I can't take this waiting! Why have they not CONTACTED me!?
I must act.

By 3:37 p.m. I have begun to plan my assault, my strategy seems a flawless one.

At 5:50 p.m., my execution of this strategy flowers, but I comprehend the artistic temperament, and know that I must not be hasty.

7:32 p.m.: I aim, and fire. And at 7:44 my house of cards receives its coat of shellaq: A message!
A message left with my answering service begging — PLEADING! — that I bestow my rare and fragile gift upon the People, just once more: No, no! Get up off of the ground! There is no need...

Well, I am no miser! I know that you, my wonderful People, are wondering, and I will share with you a small part of my magic.

Please enjoy! (And don't say I never give you nothing, see!?)

(Yes, glorious fruition.)

Fin.